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The Coburg Inn was operated by the Howis family for 150 years. It was situated on Melville Street – off Abbey Road – which was originally known as Coburg Place. It was first built as a stables, coach house, saddlers and a grocery store. When it gained a licence as an inn, it was bought by a local brewery, Swayne & Co, then passed to Plymouth Breweries and then on to Courage. After taking ladies and gentlemen to church on Sunday mornings, the coachmen would return to the Coburg where the bar was lined up with foaming beer tankards. The inn was noted for having ‘a magnificently executed coat of arms’ associated with the European dynasty of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.  The Coburg closed in 1971.

Source: Kevin Dixon

The license was held in the 1890s by my Great grandfather, Thomas Smerdon. On his death it was taken over by his son-in-law, my grandfather Frank Barton Wyatt. Due to his failing health, he was assisted in the 1960s by HIS son-in-law, Frederick William (Billie) Howis (my uncle by marriage) although the license remained in the name of his widow Susie Elizabeth Wyatt, nee Smerdon. The licence was finally taken over by Billie Howis on the death of Susie and he ran it until it closed .

Michael Barker (September 2013)

In the early 1980s I bought the end town house of three in Coburg Place, Torquay. The three were called Coburg Cottages and had been the Coburg Inn previously. It had been made into the three town houses and each had a garage underneath. An elderly lady over the road told me it had been the Coburg Inn and pointed to my lounge window and told me it had been the bar.  It was very unusual inside and I liked it very much. I left in 1983 and moved over to Paignton.

Carol Eyden (September 2024)

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